"There Might Be a War"

About a month ago, Mark flew up here for the sole purpose of interviewing my students and my co-workers about a subject near and dear to all of us: me. It was for an assignment in his creative non-fiction writing class.

The project, from start to finish, left me feeling incredibly vulnerable. I cared very much, especially, about what my students would have to say. People, young and old, that I work with every day, in a place where I have put so much of my time and energy and heart, would be talking to my best friend of 18 years. I was not to know the questions, I was not to know their answers. What would they say?

I would be forced to answer questions about myself that I really didn't feel I had the answers to. I would be confronted with my dreams. I would have to survey my life and ask myself if having "4 PREZ" on my license plate was nothing but a sham, if I felt I really had it in me.

So in what may be the most expensive creative non-fiction biographical piece ever written, prez2012.com presents this new and exciting work from up-and-coming author, and founder of the hit web site Menace World, Mark Manasse!


“Intertia” For a Change
by Mark Manasse, 5/19/06

There was high drama on the Garfield Elementary School campus the day before I arrived. One of the two fifth-grade classes that Darron Evans, wannabe future President of the United States, teaches got a bit of a tongue lashing for not performing well on in-class assignments. And Darron was tired of the excuses. He expects more. He expects change.

Garfield Elementary was one of the first Charter Schools in California. With a population over 95% Latino (according to the school’s website), this pre- through eighth-grade school is constantly fighting an uphill battle to pass the yearly California Standards Test (CST). Non-English speaking parents, extreme-low-income upbringings, and high gang prevalence are just a few of the road blocks standing in the way of the futures of these bilingually-trained fifth graders. Darron has been teaching at Garfield for six years, and knows full well that if the students don’t perform well on these state tests, that the school is in danger of losing its charter.

“I’ve tried being nice,” he tells me in passing about his recently admonished class. “But I blew up at them yesterday.”

It’s hard to imagine this gentle-natured soul becoming angry at a classroom full of eleven-year-olds. Having personally known Darron Evans for eighteen years, I would never even think to use a word like “angry” or “mean” to describe him, but these are the very words used by his students. More peculiarly to me, when asking both his co-teacher Marie Del Mar Obejero and his K-5 director Alex Hunt to describe him, immediately the word “strict” is mentioned. But how could this be? Our future president bullies little kids?

Darron has wanted to be President since the age of 11. He decided at that young age, coincidentally the age of his students now, that we lived in a “crazy” world that he wanted to “fix.” He thanks his sixth-grade teacher, Mrs. Archer, for instilling this belief:

“She had the students in the class that were ‘high readers’ do independent study. She gave us a bunch of research on the Palestinian/Israeli conflict and told us to ‘find a solution.’”

His group created Resolution 31 (utilizing sixth-grader logic, they added the birth days of every group member together which equaled 31) after reading and researching this topic for weeks. Although he can no longer remember what solution they came up with (or perhaps it is classified), he does remember being excited about changing the world, and from that day on, gave up his previous dream of being a professional baseball player. He hung up his cleats and decided to throw his ideals into the political ring.

For the remainder of elementary school through high school, he held this rather esoteric belief that he would one day be President, although he even admits he had no real concept of what that meant until a semester-long internship in Washington DC while in college. He left the confines of Stanford and traveled across the country to find out “how things work” while interning at the Department of Education. While there, Clinton delivered his 1997 State of the Union, which outlined a ten-step plan for education. Darron was amazed that as soon as the speech was over, his department went to work on implementing the plan and liked the influence the President had on education, and that when he spoke, people listened. “I like the idea of everyone listening to me [that way]” he smiles calmly. But throughout the course of the interview, it seemed that the person with the highest of aspirations for leadership positions had serious doubts at his own ability to lead.

He feels that there are two kinds of leaders “Natural Born Leaders and People who do well in given leadership positions.” Adding “…and I am not a natural born leader.”

This was an interesting revelation for a person that has noticeably succeeded in leadership roles while at Garfield Elementary. As the grade 3 through 5 representative on Garfield’s Site Council, Darron has had an instant impact. Through mere tweaking to this meeting’s format, Darron has been personally responsible for tripling the attendance of this monthly, mandatory meeting between the school administration and students’ parents. What was originally an agenda-driven, “boring” meeting, was transformed into an interactive meeting of the minds utilizing small group discussion on topical yet controversial topics such as “Immigration Law” and “Gang Awareness” making the meetings something which parents can look forward to and learn from, instead of dread.

As is the case with many leaders, it is not within them to clearly see how well they lead. At times, we must seek out other points of view.


The Boss

As I mentioned, I have known Darron for quite some time, but I wanted to get to know him more. What drove him? How do others see him? And what better place to look than his work?

Darron’s director, Alex Hunt, has known Darron since their days at Stanford. Darron was a freshman when Hunt was a senior. While not the closest of friends, he could remember such mundane details as the “old, red Camero [Darron] drove while [they] lived at Casa Zapata,” one of Stanford’s student dormitory. Hunt is now the K-5 Director, even though he also taught at Garfield for a few years before being thrown into the administrative role. He remembers rather vividly Darron applying at Garfield uncredentialed, unlike some of the other applicants. Although Darron had a history at the school with a linked outreach program from Stanford, it was not a given that he would be hired because he lacked experience. But after Darron left the interview, Hunt recalls telling the interview committee that even though Darron didn’t have a credential “[He] is not the type of person who lets himself fail.”

Over the course of the past six years of working with each other, Hunt has had some run-ins with Darron over interactions with students and parents alike. Darron is unapologetically honest and blunt with anyone who underachieves, even parents. Absolutely no one is above reproach. But when it comes down to it, he finds Darron to be the perfect leader: “He leads by example. He wouldn’t ask anything of anyone that he wouldn’t do himself.” Hunt went on to comment that Darron isn’t out for glory, but purely for the welfare of the at risk student population.

For example, after briefly checking in with Hunt a few years ago about having optional (and unpaid) Saturday School sessions for students who need or want extra help, Darron has continued to take time out of his own life to give back to the community. “He does everything in such a humble way,” obviously reflecting on Darron and the things he has accomplished while at Garfield. “Saturday School. He’s just doing it. He brings no extra attention to it.”

But what kind of man spends his Saturdays, unpaid, trying to help children that are statistically proven to have less than a fifty percent chance of graduating high school? “A near perfect teacher” according to his team-teacher, Mar.


The Team Teacher

New to the school, Mar teaches the fifth-grade Spanish block at the charter school. While Darron handles math, reading, and writing in English, Mar teaches math, reading, and writing in Spanish. Most of the children at the school come in both substandard in Spanish and English. She has been working with Darron since September and feels lucky to have met him. “He works so hard…he fights and fights, taking time out of his lunch to push students.” And when failing to further describe him in English, she used her mother tongue: “He is Exigente.” Loosely translated: “Demanding.”

She admires Darron because he does not sugar coat anything for the students. “He’s strong,” she convincingly charges with her hand slamming down on the table in a repeated chopping motion. She finds that while some teachers are too nice, Darron tells it like it is, and expects a lot. A sentiment eerily echoed by Hunt: “He challenges them and talks to them like grown ups.” Hunt added that Darron lays it all on the line with his fifth graders, letting them know the percentages and failures that they will be facing. According to Hunt, Darron lets them know “[Failure] is what [the public] expects of us.” but Darron, on the other hand, expects change.

Both his team teacher and supervisor found that Darron may push the children and himself too hard at times. Almost in perfect unison, both noted that some of his expectations for the children were unrealistic: “Not everyone is going to be a doctor or a lawyer” Mar admits. Hunt feels that Darron doesn’t acknowledge any possibility but perfection: “He wants everyone to do well, but there are times where that just isn’t realistic.”

During the conversation about realistic goal setting, both Mar and Hunt reflectively paused, almost embarrassed to reveal that it is Darron’s drive for his students’ success that sometimes leads him to be overly harsh. Hunt has had a couple of conversations with Darron about how he should say things to students while Mar noted that Darron recently asked her, “Do you think I am a mean teacher?”

Where is the line between caring and caring too much? Mar confided that Darron even unwittingly pushes her too far sometimes. “It’s hard to work with him because if I leave at 3 O’clock, I feel bad. I want to shine, too.” But in comparison, she doesn’t always feel that she stands up to the expectations Darron has created. He gave out both Mar’s and his personal telephone numbers so that students could reach them at anytime. “I didn’t like that,” she admitted. “It’s better now, but at first, they called too much.”

Mar realizes that Darron doesn’t work hard to show her up, but it his lack of a personal life that makes it easier for him to only focus on school. She feels that if he had a wife or kids, he wouldn’t be able to work the way he does, summarizing him as “vocational.”


A Vote For Darron?

Both Mar and Hunt clearly were in agreement in what problems Darron would have with being President. He has presented himself with such an unwavering belief system, neither person sees him being able to change his stance on political issues. “He’s dogmatic…and has great thinking, but it’s very hard for him to drop his beliefs,” said his team teacher. Hunt simply stated, “He can listen, but I don’t think he would want to compromise his beliefs.”

Both would indeed vote for him and think he would be great in any leadership position. They find him loyal and in touch with the Latino community. Hunt summed it up nicely stating: “We certainly have done worse before. I would vote for him…he is a ‘can do’ person.”


The Classroom

His classroom is messy and disorganized. While Mar’s classroom was immaculate with books nicely placed on shelves and desks seemingly Windexed before my arrival, Darron’s class seemed like an educational store had thrown up all over the place. Inspirational sayings were splattered incoherently on the walls; chunks of books were seemingly strewn into a reading area; and old papers and old projects lined the outskirts of his classroom. “People supposedly look at organization [as important] for instructional leaders,” Darron divulged, apparently concerned with the current shape of his classroom.

You can’t help but notice all the projects and quotes that he has painstakingly placed upon almost every square inch of free space. Constant visual reminders of what he preaches and preaches to his students again and again. On one side of the class were gigantic, five-pointed stars with details the students were supposed to fill in about their lives “Where did you come from?” questioned one point of the star. “What you left behind?” queried another. Even at this young age, Darron wants the students to reflect upon what they had accomplished and think about where they were going. I paused and reviewed these stars for quite awhile, and while Darron hurriedly tried to prepare for class, I asked if he had made a five-pointed star for himself. He stopped what he was doing, and looked at me surprised. He glanced at the stars, and what the students had done. “No,” he looked shocked. “I have no idea about that.”

Along the front wall, one of the many classroom mantras reminds the students that:
Future leaders of America:
1. Ask questions
2. Listen in class
3. Always do their best
4. Take risks
5. Participate using a strong, clear voice
6. Do their homework every day
7. Read at home in a quiet place every day and
8. Are organized.

There are also examples of math problems, sentence structures, pictures of George W. Bush compared to an ape, and numerous objects with English translations of what they are affixed to them. Interestingly, a dusty and fading American flag hung on one side of the class with a 4”x 2” piece of yellow-lined paper adhered to it inscribed with the word “Flag.” It looks as if it hasn’t been cared for in years.


The Students

The students love Darron, which is obvious from the very second they walk in the room. Even though some of them were yelled at the day before, they come right in and talk to him; many of them only coming up to Darron’s belly button.

He towers over them in both stature and desire. And while many of them admitted that he screams at them and doesn’t like it when they don’t do their homework, there is obvious respect, like a child for his father.

Near the beginning of Darron’s class, all the students move to the front of the room and join the “Community Circle,” a chance for each student to share about himself or thank/rebuke another student for something that happened the day before. There is a student group leader, no talking out of turn, and the community share couldn’t even begin until the students recited the “Community Circle Mantra” in cacophonous unison about “Mutual Respect, Attentive Listening, Appreciation, No Put Downs, And the Right to Pass.”

Unknowingly, Darron creates a political environment every day in the classroom, consistently inundating the students with his interpersonal belief system, and his students pick up on his leadership abilities and frustrations, even at such a young age.

“If Darron became President, there might be a war” said one student, followed by instant agreement from many others while Darron was out of the room. “He might get angry at one of the other Presidents.” His sometimes dour mood was likened to that of “a piranha,” “a shark,” “King Kong,” “a lawyer,” and “a detective” by loving eleven-year olds. None of which sounds extremely flattering, but when I asked if any of them would vote for Darron for President of the United States, a resounding “YES” in unison roared his young disciples. Many leaders are not liked twenty-four hours a day, but they are always respected by their followers. Sometimes, people need to be told the truth, for better or for worse.

Darron’s creativity and humor are soaked up. The students liked learning about compound sentences with his “put a comma before a but(t) joke,” and they laugh at his idea about instituting small electrical shocks into the seats of bad students. And although they weren’t wild about his desire to lengthen the school day as a means of stopping gang involvement at the school, they find him to be caring, pro Latino, and the best teacher they have ever had.

“Sometimes I get sad or embarrassed when he yells at me, but I know why he is angry… He wants the best for us…He wants us to be the shining stars of the future…He really cares about us…” one student confided in me unabashedly in front of his peers. “…but, we respect him.” I am told with an echo of “yeah” from every student in the class.


The President

Darron Evans, the man who would be President, is lost on a journey, he isn’t found. He asks questions of himself and desires the best, but is he too set in his ways? He was constantly disappointed in his responses to me, wanting them to be “better” or “more well thought out.” He desires perfection, but realizes that much of his political vigor has been put on hold with the amount of time he spends on his students, and seemingly not thinking about how to successfully lead this country.

“I’m a thirty-year-old man in an impossible job…” But he struggles every day because he wants to be the one who changes Garfield and Redwood City. That eleven-year-old boy is still inside of him with a dream that he can fix this crazy world. He knows that statistically, his students, the parents, and even the community are against him and his vision. These people aren’t supposed to succeed, a mentality that has led to much of his frustration.

“I have been impatient this year, yet I come to school every day filled with hope.” And it is this hope that flickers in his eyes and drives him: the hope that above all else, he will be the one to instill change in this world. But will he be willing to change for his political aspirations?

“I’m not a people person…and I wouldn’t like campaigning…I like my alone time more than most.” This indifference to stereotypical political necessity could be refreshing, and hopefully accepted because Darron is unwilling to do it any other way: “I’m banking people will want something different. I am not going to play party politics…and I don’t want to be beholden to anyone.”

Whether this stubbornness will be seen as strength or egotistical is yet to be seen, but it obvious that while his political stances are not quite well-defined, the packaging is very clear. Dedication, desire, and drive, and other people will either have to get on board or be thrown off. It’s going to happen Darron’s way, or it won’t happen at all.

“The way it presently works doesn’t work.” He wants more honesty and has already decided that he can “choose not to lie.” His gut instinct will guide him on matters of national security, and he will make judgment calls on what information to leave out and what information to leave in for the American public. “I want to be incorruptible…the President takes an oath to uphold the constitution,” and that is what he would do, acknowledging that he would have to somehow learn how to separate himself from occasions when death is on the line.


Intertia

Darron has coined a phrase, and he doesn’t even fully realize the depth of its meaning. He feels “intertia” (the combination of “inter” and “inertia”) works against him, because he doesn’t think he has enough drive to succeed. But it is this intertia that pushes and pushes him. His students, the parents, co-workers, and bosses hear it every day, but he doesn’t even realize how loud his intertia truly is.

He somehow believes that he’s, “nonconfrontational, which is something [he] needs to work on.” He doesn’t see it’s his actions that confront, not his words. Others do follow his lead; one that he has naturally achieved. He is a life leader, a visionary, and he doesn’t realize that comical moments to him are remarkable and awe inspiring to others: “Sometimes when I’m in class, I’ll go off on a tangent. And my students will just start spontaneously shouting ‘Mr. Evans for President. Mr. Evans for President.’”

It seems that all Darron truly wants is for everyone to find and follow his own intertia. So maybe the destination of Darron’s journey to find and follow his own will be the presidency; if not in body, perhaps in the soul of one of his young, inspired disciples.